A special election to recall San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin was certified on Tuesday and will head to voters next June.
The Department of Elections said on Tuesday that the batch of 83,484 signatures the campaign submitted in October contained enough valid signatures to trigger a recall election. That recall election will be consolidated with a statewide primary election scheduled for June 7, 2022.
The recall election of Boudin is one of several elections scheduled for next year.
On Feb. 15, 2022, voters will decide whether to recall school board members Alison Collins, Faauuga Moliga and Gabriela López. On that ballot, voters will also decide whether to keep incumbent Assessor-Recorder Joaquin Torres, who was appointed by Mayor London Breed in February 2021.
In addition to the District Attorney recall, the statewide primary election scheduled for June 7, 2022 will include races for governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, attorney general, and other statewide offices. San Francisco voters will also decide whether to re-elect City Attorney David Chiu, who was appointed to the seat by Mayor London Breed and sworn in last week.
Voters in California’s 17th Assembly District, which represents roughly the eastern half of San Francisco, will also choose a new representative in a series of elections next year. The exact timing of those elections is yet to be determined, but will likely involve both a primary and a runoff. There are four candidates in the race, and the winner must capture at least a 50% vote threshold.
On Tuesday, Breed and Supervisor Rafael Mandelman introduced a budget supplemental to offset the costs of elections next year, which include staffing, ballot printing and postage, security and other costs.
Breed and Mandelman proposed that the city pull city funds to cover the cost of the school board recall, which would otherwise be funded by the cash-strapped school district.
The Mayor’s office expects that an assembly election will take place in April, in addition to the February school board and assessor-recorder’s races, although the exact timing of the assembly races has not been confirmed by the state.
John Arntz, director of the Department of Elections, told Here/Say that the February school board recall will “ideally” be consolidated with a primary election in the assembly race. In that case, a runoff for the assembly seat could be held in April under California’s elections code. Voters in AD-17 may then have to vote on that seat again in the statewide primary in June.
Breed and Mandelman are seeking a total of $12 million to cover those elections, and will have to gain approval from a Board of Supervisors’ budget committee and the full board to enact the budget supplement.